Ethical Record The Proceedings of the Conway Hall Ethical Society Vol. 120 No. 11 £1.50 November 2015 Moncure Daniel Conway A VERY UNUSUAL VIRGINIAN see page 16 UPDATE ON ‘NO PLATFORM’ IN STUDENT MEETINGS We have some better news since the October Ethical Record (page 1) reported the banning of secularist Maryam Namazie from speaking at a Warwick students atheist society. After earnest conversations between Humanist and Secular organisations and the National Union of Students, that particular ban was lifted. Nevertheless, fear of the expression of forthright opinions and strong views on contemporary issues from being aired still lurks on campus. We can therefore expect more examples coming to light of similar, somewhat cowardly, behaviour. Universities and their student societies are supposed to be places where all theories and ideologies may be peacefully propounded and debated. {Ed.} GREENER THAN GREEN Jasper Tomlinson 3 ROSA PARKS, GANDHI AND ACTIVE NONVIOLENCE 1 Shahrar Ali 6 VIEwPOINTS C. Seymour, C. Purnell, P. Wilkinson, D. Ruskin 9 A LETTER FROM CANADA Ellen L. Ramsay 11 LONDON THINKS - ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: ALL TOO HUMAN? Caroline Christie 12 MONCURE DANIEL CONwAY: A VERY UNUSUAL VIRGINIAN Nigel Sinnott 16 KILLING ATHEISTS IN BANGLADESH Bob Churchill 22 FORTHCOMING EVENTS 24 CONWAY HALL ETHICAL SOCIETY Conway Hall Humanist Centre 25 Red Lion Square, London WC1R 4RL. www.conwayhall.org.uk Chairman: Liz Lutgendorff; Treasurer: Carl Harrison; Editor: Norman Bacrac Please email texts and viewpoints for the Editor to: [email protected] Staff Chief Executive Officer: Jim Walsh Tel: 020 7061 6745 [email protected] Administrator: Martha Lee Tel: 020 7061 6741 [email protected] Finance Officer: Linda Lamnica Tel: 020 7061 6740 [email protected] Library/Learning: S. Hawkey-Edwards Tel: 020 7061 6747 [email protected] Hon. Archivist: Carl Harrison carl @ethicalsoc.org.uk Programme/Marketing: Sid Rodrigues Tel: 020 7061 6744 [email protected] Digital Marketing: Katie Jones [email protected] Lettings Officer: Carina Dvorak Tel: 020 7061 6750 [email protected] Caretakers: Eva Aubrechtova (i/c) Tel: 020 7061 6743 [email protected] together with: Brian Biagioni, Sean Foley, Tony Fraser, Rogerio Retuerma Maintenance: Zia Hameed Tel: 020 7061 6742 [email protected] New Members We welcome the following to the society: Sue Black; Deborah Burns; Peter Cresswell; Svetiana Danilenko; Eran Hermelin; Gabriella Horecka; Micah Lax; Nicola McIntyre; Paul Pettinger; Lorna Richardson; Chris Riley; James Cook Robbins; R Robinson; Eric Schneider. Obituary – Lisa Jardine Readers would have been sorry to learn of the demise of the 2014 Conway Memorial Lecturer, Professor Lisa Jardine. It is of course especially sad when someone who has contributed so much to the intellectual scene in Britain and had still so much more to contribute is cut short prematurely. The subject of Lisa’s CML was ‘Things I didn’t know about my father’ ie Jacob Bronowski, who gave the CML in 1954. His famous book (based on the TV series) ‘The ascent of man’ confirmed many thoughtful people in their inclination to naturalism and therefore towards humanism. Lisa Jardine well exemplified her father’s examination of, and concern with, all aspects of science, literature and history. CONWAY HALL ETHICAL SOCIETY Reg. Charity No. 1156033 Founded in 1793, the Society is a progressive movement whose Charitable Objects are: the advancement of study, research and education in humanist ethical principles. We therefore invite to membership those who, rejecting the supernatural, are in sympathy with the above objects. In furtherance of these, the Society maintains the Humanist Library and Archives. The Society’s journal, Ethical Record , is issued monthly. At Conway Hall the educational programme includes Thinking on Sunday, discussions, evening courses and Sunday concerts of chamber music. Memorial meetings may be arranged. The annual subscription is £35 (£25 if a full-time student, unwaged or over 65 ) 2 Ethical Record, November 2015 GREENER THAN GREEN Jasper Tomlinson ( [email protected]) Thinking on Sunday Lecture to the Ethical Society, 4 October 2015 Invited to contribute about an aspect of energy policy, I find that my talk is about a personal progress that started from probably just this same spot, the (Fenner) Brockway Room. In 2006 a distinguished physicist, Felix Pirani, gave us insights into dark matter, comprising, it appears, much of the cosmos. When he had concluded, we gathered around, hoping to discover yet more. When talk turned to nuclear power, which I suggested was not fit for purpose, he gently suggested I should find out more about thorium. That was a beginning. The Molten Salt Reactor Thorium took me swiftly to innovative nuclear fission reactor technology, namely the molten salt reactor. I have had a lot to learn. What is it that is special about nuclear energy? Fission of a uranium atom releases a hundred million times more energy than burning an atom of carbon. No available process has a comparable energy density to nuclear fission. This fact had a thoroughly nasty demonstration at Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. It now provides the key to a marvellous component of a technological fix for global energy poverty. To enable this, it is essential that there is radical innovation in nuclear power reactor design – for more details of this visit www.moltexenergy.com . Global population numbers for the last 2,000 years – starting at about 200 million, now exceeding 7 billion – compare with CO 2 estimates for the same period. Evidently, global population above a few hundred million brings with it increases in atmospheric CO 2. Both now show runaway growth. Are then world population levels an unavoidable issue for addressing global warming? There are rather clear relationships between personal wealth, fertility, population growth, and energy availability. Ethical Record, November 2015 3 A Techno-optimistic Environmentalist As a techno-optimistic environmentalist I see a better world where most have access to affordable, safe, sustainable energy to bring them out of poverty. However, there are here some quite sharp differences of opinion. Sir David Attenborough, in an exchange of letters with me, suspected that rather than address the problem, it might do quite the reverse, encouraging human beings to think that there is no need to curb their ever expanding energy consumption and thus perpetrate further devastation on the natural world. He has considerable support for this view. How about it: do you think it fair or practicable to be telling the poor to go on living poorly as a duty to the survival of the planet? To bring my progress up to date, eventually I was able to secure 75% funding for a £100,000 study, completed in July 2015 with the release of our 75-page Molten Salt Reactor Review Study (downloadable at 4 Ethical Record, November 2015 www.energyprocessdevelopments.com .). Our study uncovered the fact that this innovation rather than being a beautiful dream, to be implemented after several decades of R&D and new science, is ready now. There are relatively small entrepreneurial firms ready with valid designs, only requiring funds to proceed. A best case scenario is switching on prototype molten salt reactors by 2024… and the major obstacle is funding. Several hundreds of millions will be spent before switch-on. All this happening is dependent on commitment at every level, from decision-makers to the widest possible public. On the inside cover of our Report there is a quotation of what J.M.Keynes may or may not have said: “ When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, Sir? ” Bullet points in favour of the Molten Salt Reactor (MSR) idea Liquid-fuelled molten salt reactors out-perform solid fuelled reactors in many ways: Safer no meltdowns; low pressure operation with no risk of explosions, or ignition of molten salts; inherent passive safety; Less waste produced because of much higher fuel burn-up (~ 90% compared with ~ 3%) and possibility with thorium fuel of ~ 300 years storage requirement in place of 10,000 years or more; Diverse fuel requirements with most fissile materials useable with little fuel preparation or validation, including legacy solid-fuelled reactor waste and weapons stockpiles such as plutonium Very compact with no pressure dome needed and below ground level operation proposed Affordable power engineered to compete in cost with coal; high temperature heat output ~750 o C giving diverse industrial uses and high efficiency in conversion to electricity Summary of MSR benefits In an implicit comparison with the industry-standard pressurized water reactor - initially a hastily adopted device for military and civil applications essentially comprising water cooling of solid fuel elements - t he liquid-fuelled Molten Salt Reactor is compact, operating at near-atmospheric pressure, not requiring a massive pressure dome; reactivity reduces with rise in output temperature; the molten salts are very stable chemically and cannot ignite; heat energy is harnessed at up to 800 0 Celsius ( ie very high); with liquid fuel use, diverse fissile material can be used, including legacy waste and decommissioned weapons. These characteristics ensure that: - reactor safety is good; it cannot melt down or release radio-activity by explosion; it has inherent passive safety, shutting down if cooling ceases; in emergency the chemistry is changed by rapidly loading the fuel/coolant salts by adding appropriate materials; corrosion control is effective; reactor can be operated below ground level; operation to minimize proliferation risk - waste is manageable with less than a tenth of the amount from solid fuels; better chemical control of waste products and with thorium fuel waste storage requirements of no more than 300 years - costs are low & affordable; burnup of fuel is above 90% ( cf 2- 3% for solid fuels); high temperatures ensure high efficiency in generating electricity and other industrial uses for the heat energy; capital costs for reactor are much reduced.